*WARNING: CONTAINS NUDITY*

Introduction

Hi, my name is Arda Koyuncu. I am a 3D character artist currently living in San Francisco. I always thought there were dark elements to fairy tales and with this in mind I wanted to create all the characters from the famous tale of Red Riding Hood in a twisted way. In my re-imagining of the story Grandma is the evil mastermind. I wanted to use steampunk elements in the image to enhance the creepy look, with machines made from dark and dull colors.

The Model

Once I had settled on the concept I spent some time collecting reference images. When I felt I had enough resources to start work on the model I started creating a body base in Maya. I tried to keep the topology as clean as possible, but since I planned to make major tweaks in ZBrush later I retopologized the model as I went along (Fig.01).

Fig.01

The first thing I do when I import a mesh into ZBrush is to make sure that I create a solid structure and silhouette. I avoid focusing on any one part in particular and try to develop the whole model at a similar rate, which helps to tie the different forms and shapes together. When I feel happy with the major forms, I export the mesh for retopology.

When sculpting both major and minor areas it is important to consider factors such as age, gender, character and profession. Here is my attempt at sculpting a hand suffering from rheumatoid arthritis (Fig.02).

Fig.02

The face is one of the most important areas of focus for the majority of characters. Whilst sculpting the sagging and wrinkles on her face I made sure that I didn't entirely lose the female form and character, despite the fact that women tend to lose their feminine look as they age. I also sculpted a rough hair mesh to make the process easier (Fig.03).